


Preface: Citadel, 2183

by ere_the_sun_rises (orphan_account)



Series: A Matter of Change [1]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Espionage, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Foreshadowing, Mass Effect 1, Minor Character Death, POV Female Character, POV First Person, Pre-Mass Effect 2, Prologue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-31
Updated: 2014-03-31
Packaged: 2018-01-17 15:37:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1393033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/ere_the_sun_rises
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Glenn and Commander Shepard would later become comrades-in-arms, be hailed as heroes and have stories told of their courageous acts and the feats they accomplished together: but years before that, they meet nearly by chance on the Citadel, exchange few words and then move on. Neither would have guessed their later involvement, but it all begins somewhere. And for Glenn, it began on the Citadel, in 2183.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Preface: Citadel, 2183

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, readers! For those who are just beginning _A Matter of Change_ : welcome. This short story was actually written long after the publication of the original series- it serves as a prelude to the main events, telling of the chance meeting of Glenn and her future comrades years before they ever work together.
> 
> To those who have already been reading: this one-shot is essentially a part of my updated canon. It was conceived as an alternate beginning of sorts, and will replace the original opening to the series. A full timeline will be coming out soon, to keep everything straight, and I hope you enjoy this piece too. I decided to publish it independently of _Trust_ , seeing as that is explicitly about the events of _Mass Effect 2_ and this piece takes place in the first game instead.
> 
> As usual- Bioware doesn't belong to me. I'm just playing in their sandbox. Enjoy!

The game was up. It was always up, but this time, I was grateful- even more so than usual. While toying with a thickheaded minor crime lord provided no end to my entertainment, playing the little vixen to his whims grew tiring in its own right. But in a few hours, it would all be over. I had his secrets, I’d extracted every little valuable bit of information he’d had to offer (the bounty was surprisingly plentiful, but these were interesting times indeed), and I had it all on an OSD. All that was left were to pack my bags…and take care of loose ends, as it were.

When he entered the room, he stretched widely, looked my way, and stalked towards me with a self-satisfied smirk on his face. “Hey, Princess.”

“How is business up front?” I asked, setting aside the datapad I’d been using and lounging further into the couch cushions.

“Like it always is,” he said, coming and hovering over me, conscious of his full body armor and my lack thereof. “Booming. Word was that krogan was on his way again.” I pouted, and he came down towards me. _Yes, that’s it, just a little closer…_ “Don’t worry, Princess. The bouncers will take care of him. He’s gonna have to give up, eventually-”

I pulled the pistol out from between the cushions and jammed it into his gut. “He won’t get the chance,” I said. I was about to squeeze the trigger when the door slammed open.

“Freeze, Fist!” a voice bellowed; but it was hard to tell who had said it, because it was a crowd of several people that rushed in with their weapons drawn. Fist backpedaled, going to stand, looking dumbly at all of them and probably calculating if reaching for his shotgun or activating the security systems were his best chance of survival.

I made the choice for him, lifted my gun arm and put a hole in his temple. Fist crumpled to the ground, and I got easily to my feet.

There was a moment of stunned silence- then one of the humans- a tall man with a pair of ugly scars slashed across his lips- turned his gun on me, bellowed, “You just lost us our best bet for information!”

I erected a biotic barrier between me and the newcomers, even as the others were shouting at their fellow to calm down and put his weapon away. When they all had done so, I let my barrier down; though I was ready to put it up again, if need be. Folding my arms, I sized them up. “I’m not sure why you came here, if it’s information you were looking for. Fist was part of a crime syndicate, not a brokering business. I’d suggest Barla Von. The volus does more than advise.”

Another one of the humans- a woman, bearing some similarity to the one that had threatened me (could they be related?)- stepped out into the front. Something told me she was the leader of this outfit. And what a strange outfit too- I counted five humans, and a turian wearing C-Sec colors thrown in for good measure. An Alliance detachment, perhaps? I counted three N7s, and they all looked like they could be siblings. Perhaps the Alliance had simply gotten fed up and brought men in to take care of business, and C-Sec had brought a representative along. Yet, somehow I figured there would be more fuss if the Alliance had officiated this. No, someone was here of their own prerogative.

This just got more delicious.

“We came here on Dr. Michel’s word,” said the woman who looked like the leader. “I’m Commander Shepard-”

“One of three, I believe?” I scanned across the three of them. “Ah, yes, that makes sense now. And I have the pleasure of addressing all three of you. The Hero of Elysium, the Sole Survivor of Akuze…and the Butcher of Torfan. My, but the winds of change do blow quite deliberately, though? It seems that those of us involved are only destined to meet.”

“We didn’t come here for riddles,” said the one male Shepard, testily. “We don’t have the time.”

“Touchy, aren’t we?” I tsked, turning and stalking slowly to another of the couches, the one facing them, and took my seat. I noticed the turian and the one fellow in the back gawking a little when I sat down. Not that I could blame them; Fist may have been prone to overblown ego and brashness, but he did dress his pets well. The dress I was currently in was an import from one of the top boutiques on Thessia; little more than a few interconnecting scraps of fabric that hugged all my curves quite nicely. “Commander, if you’re willing to work with me, I’d be more than happy to tell you what you need to know. I’ve been in with Fist for the past three months- listening to all of his calls, attending all of his meetings…”

“Surely Fist wasn’t stupid enough to let you know that much.” The turian folded his arms. “We’ve brought in his past mistresses, and they couldn’t tell us anything important.”

“Oh? Well, I can be very persuasive,” I said, stretching out languidly and flashing a smile their way. “But…he mostly did it himself. He thought it was love…told me so, while he was balls-deep inside me.” A few of the crowd flinched at that, I shrugged and brushed it off with the flicker of an eyebrow. “I didn’t think much of _that_ , to be honest…any man will tell you that; if you let him have you. And I let him have me…day, after day, after day, night after night- and he kept me around. I told him what he wanted to hear. I gave him what he wanted to have. And when that wasn’t enough, I gave him what he didn’t even _know_ he wanted.” I shrugged. “Secrets are easily bought as a woman. They don’t expect you’re capable, and before they can so much as blink you’ve made off with all of their skeletons. Most of them won’t even realize it.”

The Commander looked at me, suspiciously. “Who are you?” she asked.

“Me?” I cocked an eyebrow. “If you must know, you can call me Glenn.”

“Well, Glenn,” she said, “You said if I could work with you, you’d tell me what I needed to know.”

I straightened up out of my lounging pose, sat up on the couch and crossed my legs. “Well, send pretty boy over to sit with me and tell me what you’re after.”

The pack parted somewhat so that all of them could look at the fellow in the back, a strapping, swarthy young fellow with telltale biotic static fluffing his hair. “Uh…” he swallowed, hard. “Ma’am.”

“Or don’t,” I shrugged. “Not a deal-killer, that.” I turned to the commander. “Well, Shepard. Ask away. Fist had a big prick and an even bigger mouth; if you came to get it from him I likely know about it.”

She looked at me. “We heard from Dr. Michel that a quarian had come to her looking for help. She wanted to make a deal with the Shadow Broker; trade information she had in exchange for protection from Saren’s men.”

“Ah, Saren,” I said, nodding. “Seems to be a lot up in the air about him these days, isn’t there? I don’t understand why the Council’s so quick to defend him. I’ve never seen a turian with glowing eyes before- then, I’ve never really understood any of the Council’s motives before, either. Perhaps they’re related.”

“The quarian,” the Commander reminded me, somewhat sharply.

“Right, all right, no need to get snippy…” I held my hands up. “Right, a quarian. That’s fairly recent. I do remember her, though. She showed up here. Fist used to be an agent, you recall.”

“For the Shadow Broker?” the third N7 asked, speaking for the first time.

“Yes, for the Shadow Broker, that _is_ who we’re relating this to, yes?” I cocked an eyebrow.

“What do you mean, ‘used to be?’” another of the humans asked me, the woman with the telltale white and pink Phoenix line armor. Somehow the assault rifle she was carrying made me doubt she was a medic.

“He switched sides,” I said. “He works for Saren now.” I eyed his rapidly-cooling body where it lay on the floor. “Or, at least, he used to.”

“Why would he do that?” the turian asked, bewildered. “Betraying the Shadow Broker is suicide. He must’ve had something big.”

“He did,” I said, getting a little tired of interruptions. “Not that it matters much now. The quarian, however, unawares of his little Benedict Arnold, came asking for him to set up a meeting with the Broker.”

“Impossible,” the turian cut me off again. “No one meets the Broker in person-”

“- _which_ she also doesn’t know,” I broke in, testily. “Fist arranged for what she thinks is a meeting with the Shadow Broker. It’s a set-up; she’s meeting Saren’s men, and they’re going to kill her.” I eyed the clock. “If you hurry now, you could probably catch her- out in the alleys, behind the wards markets. I’d run.”

“That quarian’s got our only hope at exposing Saren,” the Commander snapped off, immediately. “Let’s move!”

And as quickly as the pack had come, they were gone. Understandable, I supposed. They only had but a little time.

I got off the couch, picked up Fist’s OSD, stepping over his body to go and retrieve my things. The only thing left to do now was pack.

Despite my best intentions; I ended up staying on the Citadel much longer than I’d anticipated. Negotiations with the Broker on what price to hand over some or all of Fist’s info and how much were drawn out, and I’d ended up having to rent an apartment of my own, at least for the time I’d been staying. I’d run into an old contact in the Wards and ended up visiting with them for a week or so, and other matters kept grabbing my attention, keeping me in place. I really would need to get back, though, eventually.

A part of me argued that I could just stay on the Citadel forever- I could just disappear, and start all over here. The lure of a fresh start was tempting, but I left it where it was, resisted temptation, and steeled myself with the knowledge of knowing, eventually, that I would have to go back.

Shepard (all three of them, and their crew too) popped up every once in a while, appeared in a few segments about feats of heroism on Feros, Noveria- once even stopping an asteroid from being crashed into Terra Nova by batarian terrorists. And yet, wherever Shepard went, one word kept cropping up, and it was “reaper”. Try as I might, even my most discriminatory search programs could only turn up scant, conflicting bits of evidence. The only thing that everyone could seem to agree on was that the Reapers were a machine race that had hunted the Protheans to extinction fifty thousand years ago, and then vanished completely. I might have dismissed it as myth, like everyone else seemed to be doing. And yet, my instincts remained suspicious, alert. My instincts had kept me alive for twenty-four years. I wasn’t going to give up that easily, even if it seemed like just a dead end.

I can still remember precisely where I was, the day I was proven right.

I was sitting in a café on the Presidium one day, when the lights suddenly began blaring red, and Avina’s voice echoed over the loudspeakers, warning that there was an incoming attack, to proceed to the nearest lockdown location and please remain calm.

All of that went to hell, of course- there was a mass hysteria all at once, people rushing not to the shelters but to the Wards access, likely rushing for their homes.

And after standing, in the middle of the chaos, I took off running in the opposite direction.

The access points would be too crowded. I had to get back to my apartment. I had to pick up my vital databanks, and then I had to get the hell off this station. I’d lingered long enough.

I found the lift to the C-Sec Academy and stepped inside, smashed the _down_ button and stood there bouncing on my heels, impatient, _damn_ these elevators, didn’t they go any faster?

After what seemed like forever, I reached the C-Sec Academy, which was a whirlwind of activity, officers grabbing weapons, superiors yelling out instructions- I slipped seamlessly into a side corridor and ran until I found the stairs that took me into the Upper Wards.

I halted, as I reached the top. The _Destiny Ascension_ was parked at the Tower, likely loading the Council. She began to move off even as I watched. The Citadel arms were closing, and I was running out of time.

I rushed off to my apartment- I scanned inside, hurried in, and took the essentials- shrugged into the coat that had come with me from Kahje, grabbed the OSDs and pushed them into my pockets. I snatched up the Karpov I’d brought to the Citadel, strapped the holster to my thigh and scanned once more before ducking back out. There was no use for sentiment in my life. Never had been.

It was back out to the Wards, back to C-Sec. The blast doors were closed, so I couldn’t see anything, but the station suddenly shuddered and groaned. Were the arms _opening_? I kept running, I couldn’t stop to try and consider this. But while I was in the lift that would carry me to the docking bay, the elevator jerked, and stopped.

Then the lights went off.

“ _Fuck_ ,” I muttered, emphatically, into the darkness.

With a little biotic assistance, I was able to flip the hatch open up top. I hoisted myself up, drew the Karpov and flicked on the flashlight, pointing it up. The lights of the docks were visible, several hundred feet up. Nothing to do now but climb.

I put the Karpov away, plunging myself into darkness once more. Moments later, however, my entire form erupted in a blue wash of biotics. I grabbed the cable and started to shimmy up, moving slow and steady up to the docks.

There were dead bodies littering the floors when I at last hoisted myself up to the bay. I took only a moment to catch my breath, panting before raising my head, wiping sweat from my brow and pushing inky tendrils of hair away from my eyes.

Before I went for the docks, I stopped, considered that if the Citadel had gone into siege mode, there was good reason to believe that the atmosphere might’ve been gone outside. Breaking into the offices there provided me with a breather mask. My boots could magnetize on their own. I went and punched the airlock, caution rewarding me once again as all of the air was sucked from the room. I progressed out onto the docks, and raised my omni-tool to the first vessel I found that looked spaceworthy; small enough to slip by and large enough to be able to utilize a mass relay. I broke in, hoped whoever I was stealing this from could replace it. Hell, I could probably hire someone to return it, if I really wanted to. Now, though, I needed to get out, and I wasn’t above petty crime to do it.

I sat down in the pilot’s seat, powered on the systems. As the visual display came up, I saw that the arms were opening- they were pulling out to full again, and an entire naval battle was taking place inside- geth ships were being torn to shreds by the Alliance fleet. How had they gotten here? What was going on? Pushing down these questions, I took off, initializing the FTL sequence. I would need a few feet to make the jump, and down here was as good a place as any.

But the Alliance fleet were moving in my direction. The geth had been mostly decimated, though I saw fragments of Council and human ships that had been destroyed floating in the nebula as well. What was here that needed to be secured?

And then I saw it. Out my starboard side window, larger than life, huge and unyielding, an infinite expanse of dark metal peppered with blue lights, clinging to the Citadel Tower like a leaf bug.

 _Reapers,_ I thought, wide-eyed, unbelieving, for once my mind drawing a complete blank. I seemed to pass by it in slow motion, in silence.

And then it was gone, streaks of light in its place as I made the jump. Witless, wordless, it was all I could do to make it to the relay and plot my course to the Sahrabarik system. It would be two years before it all caught up with me. But not a day went by until then that I ever forgot it.


End file.
